The Kor'kron have taken over the Troll area in Orgrimmar, as well as Razor Hill, and are advancing on Sen'jin Village. You will team up with Thrall, Vol'jin, and Chen Stormstout to push them back and retake Razor Hill.

The Darkspear Rebellion
Patch 5.3 starts setting up the story for Patch 5.4 and brings the fight back to Azeroth. One of the first things Horde players will notice is the Troll area of the Valley of Spirits in Orgrimmar has been taken over by the Kor'kron Guard, with Kor'kron Overseers taking aim at the residents. The trainers, bank, auction house, and every other NPC has been shut down, only talking about how dangerous it is now.

Things aren't much better for the Trolls outside of Orgrimmar, as they are being kept in cages or down on their knees, blindfolded, in front of armed and Neutral flagged Kor'kron Grunts. Riko is standing on some crates as well, and he is likely involved in the Patch 5.3 quests.

Further south in Razor Hill the Kor'korn have also posted guards, but operations are still continuing normally there. High Overseer Bloodmane has moved down to Razor Hill from his position outside of Orgrimmar.

Moving further south to Sen'jin Village, the guard presence there has been greatly increased, with the guards asking if you are going to help and saying "Welcome to da' revolution".

Going west to the Barrens, it looks different if you are level 90, similar to the Krasarang Wild changes. You can help to escort the Barrens Caravans through safely, as they are attacked when they pass through the Barrens. Doing so will give you a box of surplus supplies, required for a new weekly quest.

Four new Kor'kron camps have been added around the Barrens, harvesting Stone, Lumber, Oil, and Meat for the war effort. It appears they have also hired some Goblin Mercenaries to handle some of the work.

Taran Zhu: Tauren! What have your people done? You have dredged open a scar within our sacred Vale!Sunwalker Dezco: Lord Zhu, please understand - the orc "Warchief" who ordered the deed no longer speaks for the whole of the Horde. Many voices are rising up against him.Taran Zhu: Your politics are no concern of mine. Your Horde has disrespected the sanctity of this place. You are no longer welcome here - leave at once!Sunwalker Dezco: Give us time, Lord Zhu. Give us the opportunity to bring Hellscream to justice.Taran Zhu: Sunwalker, I respect your people. You have aided us in our campaign against the Sha and the Thunder King. Otherwise, I would've already ordered the Shado-Pan to purge this entire shrine. But my patience is at an end. The Horde must leave.Sunwalker Dezco: Please. Give us time to make this right.
Taran Zhu stares grimly into the distance.Taran Zhu: Very well. You have until season's end. No longer. We pandaren are no strangers to dealing with tyrants. The coming battle will try your souls. May the celestials guide your actions.

Battle of Razor Hill
The Horde begin by traveling to Sen'jin village after completing two of the new scenarios, and speaking with Vol'jin. He sends you in to the Barrens to collect 15 Lumber, Stone, Oil, and Meat, which requires killing one mob per item, looting crates with the items, or escorting the caravans that travel through the Barrens.

After a solid victory in Sen'jin Village, you march onward to Razor Hill with Vol'jin and Chen Stormstout. Upon arriving at Razor Hill, the battle is already underway in the air and on the ground. You defeat some guards, named NPCs, and release captive Razor Hill NPCs from cages before heading to see Vol'jin once again. Once at the small new Sanctuary area outside of Razor Hill, Baine Bloodhoof shows up to speak with Vol'jin about helping the revolution.

Darkspear Rebellion QuartermasterRavika, the Darkspear Rebellion Quartermaster can be found in Sen'jin Village before you complete all of the Battle for Razor Hill questline, and outside of Razor Hill once you have retaken the city. She sells various items for the new Barrens resources (Kor'kron Stone, Kor'kron Oil, Kor'kron Lumber, Kor'kron Meat).

Transmogrify From Bank and Void Storage
Patch 5.3 adds the ability to transmogrify to items that are located in your bank or Void Storage without having them in your bags!

New Scenarios
Four new Scenarios are being added in Patch 5.3.

Story and Lore
Lorewalker Cho will have a new story to tell in Patch 5.3, which you must listen to before doing the Blood in the Snow Scenario. You can also help the Old Seer climb Mount Neverest to learn about the final Sha and earn some item level 502 boots!

Battleground Roles
Patch 5.3 finally adds roles to queuing for random battlegrounds. The role you select is used to try and balance the number of healers on both sides.

Deepwind Gorge Battleground
Deepwind Gorge is set in the western part of the Valley of the Four Winds, in a gorge that is only present in the battleground, not in the regular world. This is a 15 player battleground for level 90 players.

The battleground has two different objectives, the first being the three mines. There is a northern Pandaren mine, central mine, and a southern Goblin mine. The mines are captured like the bases in other battlegrounds, just clicking the flag and capturing it. While you hold the mine NPCs will mine gold for your faction, bringing you closer to the 1600 resources required to win.

The second objective is the cart of gold placed at each faction's base. You can click the cart to attach it to yourself, and then walk back to your base to capture it. You do not need your own team's cart to be present to capture, unlike the normal battleground flags. Holding the cart limits your movement speed to normal running speed. If you kill the enemy cart holder, you must click on the cart to return it to your base before someone on the other team clicks to pick it up. Capturing the cart rewards you with 20 bonus honor and 200 resources and actually steals 200 from the enemy team.

Tiger's Peak Arena
Tiger's Peak is an open circle, with two smaller half circles that will allow some LoS on each side. There are two raised platforms on the left and right side of the arena that can only be climbed via a set of stairs on the side facing the wall. There is a fence around the side of the platform facing the center of the arena which you can jump over to leave the platform, but it is too high to jump from the arena to the platform. The fence does not block line of sight though, so you can cast on players in the center of the arena from the platform.

Patch 5.3 Achievement Rewards
Patch 5.3 adds many new achievements, including a few with rewards. You can pick up new titles from Pet Battles, Deepwind Gorge achievements, and the new Barrens quest line, as well as another Brawler's Guild invite and new shirt from the Brawler's Guild, and an Armored Dragonhawk for collecting 200 mounts!

Name

Side

Points

Reward

Category

Brutal Pet BrawlerWin 250 PvP pet battles through Find Battle with a full team of level 25 pets.

Brawler's Guild Changes
Patch 5.3 adds several new bosses to the Brawler's Guild, as well as some other things:

Card Trader Ami will sell you cards that allow you to fight bosses from ranks you have already defeated.

Defeating some of the new bosses will give you access to some of the new Brawler's Guild shirts. These shirts all have an equip effect, which looks similar to the effect of Precious' Ribbon, rewarding you with an extra buff on you at all times.

Profession Changes
There aren't many profession changes in Patch 5.3, but the major one makes leveling mining and herbalism possible in Pandaria with a low skill level.

Miners can now level mining from a low skill level completely in Pandaria. Nodes will yield Ghost Iron Nuggets with the amount being determined by your skill level. You can combine ten nuggets to make one ore.

Herbalists can now level herbalism from a low skill level completely in Pandaria. Nodes will yield a partial herb with the amount being determined by your skill level. You can combine 10 of the partial herbs to form a complete herb.

Currently on the PTR, you will sometimes get fragments and the actual herb or ore when gathering near the minimum level for that node type.

The Engineering mount and pet (Skyclaw and Pierre) won't make it in to Patch 5.3.

New Battle Pets
Patch 5.3 brings 20 new Battle Pets to World of Warcraft. Most of the new Battle Pets are part of either the Patch 5.2 content or The Burning Crusade's T4 and T5 raids. Unfortunately, Pierre has been pushed back again to Patch 5.4. In addition to the many balance/functionality changes announced for Battle Pets in the 5.3 Patch Notes, Simca has created an extensive list of Unannounced Battle Pet Changes.

The Unborn Val'kyr's exact spawning mechanism is currently unknown, but it has been sighted in at least two different locations that happen to be along the paths of rare spawn mobs in Northrend. It is quite possible that the Unborn Val'kyr randomly spawns in place of Northrend rares.

The Blossoming Ancient is a new pet that will be available in the near future from the Blizzard Store. Its color changes with the seasons.

Pet Battle Spectating
Patch 5.3 will allow you to see the battle that is taking place when players are doing battle with Wild Pets out in the world. Currently you just see a player standing there idly while they are fighting. This won't allow you to target the battle pets or see numbers for health and damage.

Dungeon Journal UI and Loot Specialization Menu
Patch 5.3 finally makes it faster to move through the Dungeon Journal by putting boss selections for an instance on the left always, and loot, abilities, and model on the right, making it much faster to switch between bosses to find the right loot list.

There is also now a Loot Specialization menu, which allows you to choose what spec you want loot for when getting bonus rolls, Raid Finder, and Pandarian quest rewards.

In-game Browser and Support Tools in 5.3
Keep in mind that the browser is limited to the Battle.net support site only. You can't use it to visit the official forums or other websites.

Originally Posted by Blizzard
(Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

We’re adding a feature-limited web browser to World of Warcraft that will replace the in-game support system with a direct portal to the Battle.net Support site. Our aim is to give players in-game easy access to the site’s robust knowledge base and support contact system.

We’ve gone to great lengths to improve our website support systems and we want to offer access to all of its robust features in-game. The new browser will make it it easier to find information to help you resolve issues you’re experiencing or contact our representatives if you need a little extra help.

Gamon Updates
Everyone has a role to play in the upcoming war, even Gamon! He got a few upgrades in Patch 5.3, as he is now a level 90 Rare Elite with 39 million health.

New and Modified Maps

New Loading Screens

AskMrRobot UpdatedAskMrRobot is ready to go for Patch 5.3, so get started picking out your upgrades! Keep in mind they have a free trial that works for a week.

OpenRaidOpenRaid may be a good source to find players for Heroic Scenarios if you don't have any luck with your guild or friends being online!

Patch 5.3 Video Recap
Don't have time to read the full patch notes? Jess is here with a fast paced recap of the changes coming this week!

WoWDB Addon Data Collection
Quickly populating the database with 5.3 additions is done with the help of many players. The more people that contribute data, the more accurate and quickly we can update the database.

To help out, just click here if you have Curse Client already installed.

When you are playing the addon will gather data and save it. When you are done playing, Curse Client will see the game close and upload the collected data from the addon. You can see the last time data was uploaded by looking in the Plugins tab of the options, as well as making sure the addon is enabled there.

Been trying to find more information about this, as in whether or not it applies to norm/heroic raids and getting some actual numbers/how long does it carry over/etc. I'm guessing its a 5% increase up to maybe a cap of 30, but Blizzard's mum on actual numbers like they are with TF.

There was no Q&A at the end, so unfortunately I didn't get to ask about it. =(

Judging from his remarks about the Celestials being "so chatty" and dismissing their words as "just talk talk talk talk", I have the distinct feeling our friend the Black Prince has learned little, if anything, from his trials.

For a filler patch between major raids... this is surprisingly massive. Well done Blizzard. I hate on you a lot for seemingly common sense mistakes and what I perceive to be blatant ignorance for simple issues. Yet for all that hate, you give us a patch I'm really excited for. A lot of content coming our way in so short a time. This stuff gives me hope WoW isn't gonna taper off like the past few quarterly reports have showed.

They seem to be alternating between content heavy patches and technical adjustment heavy patches.

The tick-tock way of patching is a good way to do things IMO. With the tech heavy patches if things bug out, the amount of stuff affected would be less, and when it's time to do content heavy patches all the kinks in the base tech would have already been worked out.

I would say the page listing new patch features is surprisingly large. Hate to be negative but there's really not that much there in this patch, especially if this is 'increased quantity and quality of patches' as being the new mantra/model. Most are bored stiff of Pandaria and yes a step back to old Azeroth is good but frighteningly little in way of meaty substance here Blizz. I'm unsubbed, this will not make me go back, not even close. Maybe next patch.

I sat through the live stream, wondering what all the smoke and mirrors was about, and trying to decide if all the bizarre nerfs and "fixes" are worth my $15 per month, being disgusted at the laissez faire attitudes of most of the Developers towards the people who actually play this game and pay their salaries.